Kari pulled into a parking spot at work and took a deep breath, trying to settle her jumping nerves. Overnight, she had decided it was time to do something about what had made yesterday so shitty.
Assembling a list of all the extracurricular tasks and projects she did had been eye-opening, even though she was aware that it cut into her workday on an all-too-frequent basis. Well, now was the time to end it. Kari got out of her car and marched into the office.
After locking her purse in her desk, Kari approached Logan’s secretary, sitting at her station outside his office. Most of the available surface was covered with framed photographs of her family, a potted plant looking like it wanted to take a nose dive off the corner. Or maybe that was just Kari’s reaction to the crowded scene.
“Good morning, Camille. Does Logan have any time today? Fifteen minutes?”
Camille glanced at her computer screen, then twisted around in her chair, peering into Logan’s office. I think he’s free now. Mr. Logan?”
Logan looked up from whatever he was reading and waved a hand. “Come on in, Kari.”
Crap. She hadn’t expected he’d be available right away. She’d figured she would have time to compose herself, think about what she was going to say. But no, that wouldn’t be consistent with how her life was working out just about now. She stepped into Logan’s office and took the chair he indicated.
“Great work on the social yesterday,” he said as she sat.
“Thanks. That was actually what I wanted to talk to you about.”
Logan rested his elbows on his desk and steepled his fingers. “What’s up?”
Kari folded her hands in her lap, trying to summon up a calm she didn’t feel. “Over the years since I started working here, I’ve taken on a lot of what I might call ‘extracurricular’ tasks. Like organizing the social. Doing the newsletter. Maintaining the birthday list. Planning the twice-annual potlucks. If someone’s having baby or getting married, I’m expected to organize a party for it. I even make sure there’s always ice in the break room freezer. That sort of thing.”
Logan nodded. “Okay.”
“I’m also really swamped with my actual work. But these extracurricular things have their own schedule, and they’re time-consuming, so they end up derailing me. I’d like to see if we could get some or all of these tasks reassigned. Or if they aren’t important, then let’s just stop doing them.”
“I wasn’t aware that you were doing so much,” Logan said, leaning back in his chair.
No, you just didn’t bother to think about it. Kari elected not to voice that thought. “Well, I am. And I think it’s fair if the load gets spread around, especially to people who never seem to take this kind of thing on. I have had help here and there, but it always comes from the same few people. It wouldn’t be right to hand these tasks off to them either.”
The corners of Logan’s mouth drew down and he nodded. “That sounds fair. Have any ideas of who to assign these things to?”
Kari repressed a smile. “I do.”
Rob looked up from the printouts on his desk, the result of Sandra’s complete investigation into the help desk specialist’s involvement in post-Gamergate activities. “This is ugly,” he said to the help desk manager.
Sandra nodded. “I think he’s a lone actor, but…”
“But this is bad enough.” The posts from an internet chat room contained boasts that the man was in a position to fuck the bitch up good and just wait and see—she’ll get what’s coming to her, among other more explicit slurs and threats directed toward Anna. And the boasts and menacing promises only increased in intensity over time. Rob made a face. “This is awful.”
“It’s pretty pathetic, really.” Gloria Yao, Potomac Games’ in-house counsel, leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs, leafing through her own set of printouts. “When we look at what he’s actually done, not helping Anna with her laptop seems to be his idea of all-out warfare, despite his keyboard commando persona online.”
Rob shook his head. “Regardless, he’s got to go. Anna’s history of being targeted by this group makes this especially worrying, but we can’t have this kind of attitude from any of our employees toward anyone—let alone any of our other employees. And I shudder to think of what he could do if he decided to up the ante.”
Gloria raised her hands. “Not disagreeing. And he’s in his probationary period. We can let him go for any reason or no reason with zero consequences. And I’m also letting law enforcement know. They don’t have the best track record on following through on this stuff, but we have to do what we can.”
“But even if he’s a lone actor, we have to consider the effect he may have had on the rest of my staff,” Sandra said, her dark eyes troubled.
“I agree.” Rob tapped the printouts to square them and set them aside. “Those are going in his HR file, at any rate. Just in case. What do you want to do about your remaining staff, Sandra?”
“I think we need some emergency training. Sexual harassment, use of company materials, the whole shebang. It’s going to create a lot of eye-rolling, but if we can use Anna’s experiences as part of the training, it might make the danger more real to them.”
“Okay, how can I help?” Rob asked. Reminded of Kari’s situation, he wasn’t about to have Sandra shoulder the burden of this impossible situation.
“You were going to go to the Los Angeles office next week, right?”
He nodded.
“Brenda’s going to need support on this,” she said, naming the Los Angeles I.T. team’s manager. “I think it would be helpful if we got you out there sooner, organized the training to coincide with your visit. So you can stop in, check in and personally emphasize to Brenda’s staff how important this is.”
“I think you have an outsized idea of what my presence will do, but okay.”
“Well, that’s not all…” Sandra trailed off, as if what she was about to ask was going to be too much.
“Out with it.”
“Maybe you could stop in Austin on your way home, do the same thing with Trin and their staff there?”
That would mean extending his trip by at least a day. Maybe two. And he had Hugo to think about now. And Kari had so much anxiety about taking care of Hugo already.
But he had to do it. This was too important.
“Yes.”
“What did you do?”
Kari looked up from her bookkeeping program to find Sapna staring at her from the doorway, brown eyes bright with glee.
“What do you mean, what did I do?”
“The boys are pissed. They’ve all been assigned to do all the emotional labor crap you’ve carried on doing for at least five years.”
“Oh. That.” Kari clipped her lips closed but let her eyebrows lift.
“You look positively evil,” Sapna said. “I love it.” She came into Kari’s office, shutting the door behind her and sitting in her guest chair. “Spill.”
“I just finally decided I’d go to Logan and show him just how much extracurricular stuff I’ve been doing. I pointed out that it was interfering with the work that I’m actually paid to do. I suggested he re-allocate those tasks explicitly to people who hadn’t ever chipped in before and he agreed.”
“Result: a bunch of guys each get one single task off the massive list of stuff you’ve been carrying almost singlehandedly and each one of them whines like a baby.” Sapna twisted a heavy silver ring on her thumb. “I love it. Well, not the whining part. That’s annoying as fuck. But the justice of it all. Did Logan say anything about the fact that you’ve reassigned everything to a list of all men?”
“He didn’t. Maybe he didn’t notice.”
“Regardless. I’ll take the win for the time being. Until we end up with events that are badly planned. Because among the whiners there were a few ‘but how hard can it be?’ guys who’ve clearly never done anything like this before in their lives.” Sapna twirled a strand of glossy black hair around a finger and smirked.
“It isn’t that hard,” Kari said.
Sapna cackled. “Not hard for you with your knowledge of how to get things done and your organization and your endless lists. These dudes are just going to toss themselves at the problem like birds flying at a plate glass window and wonder why they end up on the ground, stunned.”
Kari laughed at the image. “Well, we shall see. This way I at least have time to do my actual job. And with that, shoo. I have some maintenance appointments to make.”
Sapna stood, grinning. “You say that like it’s something you actually want to do.”
“It’s my job. And I’m good at it.”
That evening, Rob waited for Kari to get home, pacing his living room until she pulled up in front of her house. She emerged from the car with a grocery bag, a bouquet of flowers sprouting from the top.
Huh. He wondered what the occasion was. Picking up his phone, he composed a quick text, asking if he could go over.
Sure, was her almost immediate reply. Let yourself in.
Walking the short distance to her front door, he tried to find the right words to ask what was sounding more and more like a pretty big favor. He opened her door. “Kari?”
“In the kitchen,” she called.
He walked to the back of the house and found her arranging the bouquet in a clear glass vase, simple and clean-lined like most of her possessions.
“Do you have a new admirer?” he asked, not proud of the little spurt of jealousy that flared in him.
She gave him a sarcastic look. “No. These are from me to me.”
“Celebrating something?”
“A bit. I managed to solve the problem I was telling you about yesterday.”
“That’s excellent. And—I wanted to talk about yesterday.”
She tensed. “Yes?”
“Liz called last night.”
“Your ex.” Kari’s expression shuttered.
“Yes. She was upset about Mia moving to New York. We ended up talking. Really talking about something other than Mia’s upbringing, for the first time since before everything went bad.”
Kari was looking at him with widened eyes. “Are you…and she…”
Rob realized what she was asking. “What? Oh, God no. Liz lives in Missouri now. With her husband. We still don’t like each other. But she said something that stopped me in my tracks.”
“What was that?”
“She said she had been jealous of me. Of how close I am to Mia, and also, well. She made it clear that you were right about who gets credit for nurturing and who gets taken for granted.”
“She did?”
“She did. And I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. I also want to thank you for opening my eyes, as little as they wanted to be pried open.”
“Oh.” Kari threaded the last stem into the vase and stood back to assess her handiwork. She shot him a quick glance. “Thank you for that.”
Rob paused, realizing what he had to say now was going to sound like a quid pro quo—not something he wanted. “So, I have something to ask of you. And I don’t know where we are.”
She looked at him, her expression blank. “Where we are?”
“You and me. Are we okay?”
She nodded, her eyebrows drawing together. “I think we are. Do you?”
“Yes. I’d like us to be, at least.”
“So what do you need to ask me about?”
“The situation at work. I need to go out of town for a few days. Which would normally not be a problem at all. But now I have Hugo. He’s never been in a kennel. He’s already stressed. I—” He cringed at the way this sounded. Transactional. Like he was using her.
Kari held up a hand. “I told you I would take him.”
“I know you said you would before. But I also know you’re not exactly a pet person.”
“You’ll tell me what to do, right? How to take care of him?” Kari adjusted a flower.
“Of course. I found a dog walker who will come in and take him for a walk in the middle of the day.”
Kari frowned. “You want some stranger to come to my house? To get a key to my house?”
Rob blinked. “Oh.” He hadn’t considered that.
Kari shook her head. “No. This is my first house. It may sound silly, but I’m not ready to have some stranger coming in here.”
Rob scrubbed his face with his hands. “Okay…I guess I can…”
“I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it. I just won’t do it that way. Let me see if Sam can stop in and walk him. How many days?” Kari picked up her phone and tapped at it, looking at him expectantly.
“Oh.” He should have known she would come up with a plan. Warmth bloomed in his chest. He moved closer to her. Close enough to reach out and touch her. His fingers practically vibrated with the desire to do so. “Three days. Tomorrow through Friday.”
“Tomorrow?” Her eyes widened, but she tapped out a brisk message on her phone’s screen.
“I had to rearrange my schedule. It’s pretty urgent.” He finally let his fingertips graze her upper arm, the barest touch. “If Hugo needs to go to a kennel, he can go to a kennel.”
She shook her head, looking at her phone. “I got this. And Sam says her schedule is open in the middle of the day. She can come by and walk him.”
“Kari.” She went still. “Stop. Don’t just do something because someone asked it of you.”
Kari’s head snapped up. “What? No.” Not today of all days. Not after what she had accomplished today. She wasn’t that person anymore.
“Do you really want to take Hugo for three whole days?”
“Want to? No. I’ve never been responsible for a pet before. But Sam’s really good with them. She’ll help. I’ll muddle through. We’ll muddle through.”
“Okay. I really appreciate it.”
“Maybe you should bring him over this evening, get him used to my place a little.”
“Good idea. How about I go get us something for dinner and bring him with me?”
“I can make us something.”
Rob put his hands on her shoulders, pulling her to him and wrapping his arms around her. “No. Let me take care of you for once.”
Her hands slid around his waist and her head came to rest on his shoulder as she remembered her wish to be taken care of. “That sounds nice, actually.”
“Excellent. What do you want?”
Kari considered. “I want to not have to choose.” Somehow, the idea of not having to make a decision was the most luxurious thing she could think of.
He squeezed her tighter and said, “You got it.”
She straightened and leaned back in his arms. “Why don’t you bring Hugo over here before you go get the food? That way he and I can get acquainted.”
“You sure?”
She nodded. “Does he need anything?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like…food or something?”
“He’s been fed for the evening. I’ll bring him over with some of his other stuff.”
“Dogs have stuff?”
“Toys. Food and water bowls. You know. Stuff.”
“Okay, then.” She lifted the vase of flowers and put it in the center of the dining room table as Rob left. She moved into the living room to tidy a stack of books on the coffee table.
“Silly. You act like you’re having a human guest over,” she chided herself. “As if the dog is going to notice clutter.”
Her front door opened and Rob came in, Hugo on his heels, tags jingling on the dog’s collar. Hugo’s furry face swung around as he took in these new surroundings and something in Kari melted a little. The poor guy had been passed from person to person lately, his doggy life turned all upside-down. She bent down and extended a hand. Hugo sniffed it, then moved closer to her. She ran her fingertips over the top of his head. The fur there was velvety soft, his ears stiff and springy. “Hey there, guy.”
Rob dropped a thick piece of rope knotted at both ends and a hard rubber bone on the floor. “I’ll just take this into the kitchen and fill it with water,” he said, holding up a red plastic bowl.
“Thanks.” Kari didn’t look away from the dog, who was regarding her with dark, soulful eyes. She ran her hands down into the coarse, shaggy fur of his shoulders, digging her fingers in, massaging a little. Hugo groaned and slid all the way to the floor, rolling over onto his back. “Does he want me to rub his belly?” Kari called out.
“He loves that.” Rob’s voice from the kitchen sounded amused.
She crouched down and rubbed the dog’s belly while he twisted his long nose this way and that, apparently enjoying the attention, his front paws flopping with abandon. A bubble of pure joy twisted up behind Kari’s sternum.
“You have a friend for life.” Rob appeared in the doorway, drying his hands on a dish towel and the bubble expanded, threatening to stop her breath. His eyes creased with humor and affection and Kari wanted to cry from the pure perfection of it. His love for his daughter, her dog, all of it.
She scratched the softer fur under Hugo’s chin. “We’re going to be good friends, aren’t we, boy?”
The dog looked at her with eyes half-lidded with pleasure and his tongue lolled out of his mouth.
Rob laughed softly. “I think that’s a yes.”